Children's story

Once upon a time...

There would usually be a beautiful princess, a brave knight, or a clumsy animal after that line, but once upon a time, there was an average-looking witch with averagely outstanding powers and an averagely evil moral code.

She was the most average person you could imagine, with plain stockings that had no polka dots and a nose that had no warts. She was no scarier than the old lady who lived down your street.

The witch owned a black cat and a black raven. There were both average pets who only got into average escapades like spilling the witch’s cauldron and breaking glass vials.

“Oh, Kat and Raving!” The witch would cry, exasperated by these accidents, for she was not very creative with their names either. “You’ve created quite a mess in the workshop today! What am I to do? I ought to turn you into worms, you clumsy creatures.”

And they would scurry, dash, and run away before the witch turned them into slimy worms.

On a horrid rainy day, the witch went out to look for horrid, smelly ingredients, for they were only available in the rain.

She left the cottage with only a warning; it was the warning she gave every time she left the cottage:

“Stay out of my workshop or you’ll turn into worms!” Kat, the cat, and Raving, the raven, would always disobey the witch, for they were mischievous little things and they couldn’t help themselves.

The witch’s workshop was filled with the most wondrous and colorful things you can imagine—averagely wonderful, though.

There was a bottle that erupted like a volcano every five seconds but was covered by a cork, and another that had bubbles of a million different colors and a jar of singing flies.

Kat and Raving would pop the bubbles, sing with the singing flies, and try to cast spells too, just like the witch.

Raving would carry the potions with his cunning beak, and Kat would open the jars with her clever paws. Smoke would erupt, and the smoke would change the two in funny ways.

Kat would change into three different colors, and Raving’s feet would grow by many feet. The effects would end after a couple of minutes.

Today they mixed a jar of funny-shaped slugs with the label “Hirundinea” written on it with a green potion, and soon the cauldron began to bubble loudly and even louder until...

BOOM!

The cauldron exploded and blasted the two out through the roof until they landed in a nearby meadow on the soft grass.

This had never happened before.

Raving tried to flap his wings to fly back to the cottage, but his wings were no longer there. Kat stretched out her paws to run back to the cottage, but her paws were no longer there.

All they had were slimy tails and thin, oblong bodies. They had become worms—not just any worms, leeches! They had become leeches! And because leeches needed to be parasitically attached to a human to survive, they immediately withered and died.

It served them right for pushing their luck!

Just kidding.

Fortunately for Kat and Raving, they had become the non-parasitic filter-feeding leeches and needed to hurry to the nearest lake or else they would really desiccate and die for real.

The nearest lake was many miles away, but the witch had a pond for her slimy fish at the cottage, so they had to hurry back to the cottage before they died.

Leeches have no legs, so Kat had to crawl. Leeches have no wings, so Raving had to crawl.

They crawled and crawled till the rain stopped and the sun came up to burn their leech-y skin, and they met a snail, Ms. Snell.

Ms. Snell was surprised to see two leeches crawling in the meadow, and so she said,

“Oh! You poor things! What brings you to the meadow?”

Kat and Raving told Ms. Snell what happened to them.

“You foolish creatures, why were you messing with potions in the first place?!” She cried angrily and stormed away slowly, for she was a snail and could not give the dramatic effect she wanted, so she turned and said:

“Serves you right for being mischievous, but hop on my shell; I’ll surely be faster than your unsuited bodies.”

Kat and Raving latched onto the shell, and Ms. Snell kindly but slowly carried them across the meadow until they met a lizard, Mr. Lizzly.

“Oh my! What do we have here?!” Mr. Lizzly said. “Two worms on a snail?!”

"Oh, Mr. Lizzly,” Ms. Snell said, narrating the tale of the two leeches.

“Oh my!” said Mr. Lizzly. “You won’t make it in time; they’ll be desiccated before long. Hop on my back; it will be a lot faster.”

Ms. Snell crawled to Mr. Lizzly’s lizard-y back, and soon Mr. Lizzly was slithering across the meadow, much quicker than Ms. Snell but not fast enough.

The sun was getting hotter, and the two worms feared for their lives. And luckily, they came across a snake, Mr. Slade.

Snakes were very sly creatures and were not usually trusted in the meadow; they were fond of bullying other tiny creatures like snails and lizards.

“What an unusual sight!" Mr. Slade hissed. Mr. Lizzly ignored Mr. Slade and slithered even quicker.

“I won’t bite; why are you all piled up on each other?” Mr. Slade asked.

“If you must know, Mr. Slade,” Ms. Snell said with her nose in the air that she did not like Mr. Slade; he was a snake, and snakes were bullies. “We’re hurrying over to the pond to get these worms there before they dry up and die.”

"Well, I doubt you would make it in time,” Mr. Slade commented. “Would you like my assistance?"

“We don’t need your help, Mr. Slade; goodbye.” Mr. Lizzly said.

“Please, Mr. Lizzly, let me help you. These worms won’t make it in time.’ Kat and Raving were desperate now and took Mr. Slade’s help. Mr. Lizzly slithered onto Mr. Slade’s back.

And now Mr. Slade slid through the meadow much quicker than both Mr. Lizzly and Ms. Snell combined. It seemed like they would make it in time until they came across a huge boulder. It was just a few feet away from the witch’s cottage. The boulder was there to keep the cottage hidden from trespassing children who accused witches of trying to bake them.

“Oh my!” exclaimed Mr. Slade.

“What do we do now?” asked Mr. Lizzly.

“It looks like this is the end of the road, Kat and Raving.” Ms. Snell sighed. ‘What do we do now?!”

Kat and Raving cried to each other. They regretted going into the workshop and knew that if they could turn back time, they would never step paw or wing inside the room.

“I guess this is the end for us, Raving.” Kat wept hopelessly.

“I miss the witch; I wish we had never disobeyed her!” Raving cried. “And now we are going to die and never see her again; how awful!”

“Oh dear!” said Ms. Snell. “I wish there was something we could do." And just then, Mrs. Hawkins, the hawk, swooped down from the sky. She had seen the five creatures from afar and wondered if anything was amiss.

“Hurrah!” cried the five for Mrs. Hawkins could fly over the boulder. “It’s a miracle!”

Mrs. Hawkins was confused, and then Ms. Snell explained the situation to Mrs. Hawkins.

“Hurry!” cried Mrs. Hawkins as she grabbed Mr. Slade by his tail. “I’ll drop you over the pond.”

Mrs. Hawkins soared quickly above the sky, and soon they were above the pond in a matter of seconds.

“Thank you so much; we couldn’t have done it without your help.” Kat and Raving said as they both got ready to fall into the pond.

“You’re welcome!’ said Ms. Snell, Mr. Lizzly, Mrs. Hawkins, and Mr. Slade together.

Kat and Hawkins fell into the pond with a tiny, great splash. And to their joy, the witch was outside in the pond.

If it had been a regular person, she would have just ignored the tiny splash, but the witch was an averagely clever witch who had noticed the blast in the roof and her missing pets and suspected they had been involved in an accident with the potions.

The witch came over to the two worms and laughed.

“I told you two, you would turn into worms!” she grinned and waved her hands to cast a spell. “Reverse!”

The two worms were enveloped in smoke, and they transformed back to their original forms. Kat was a cat once more, and Raving was a raven as well.

“I hope you’ve learned your lesson.” The witch said this as she carried them into the cottage. Kat and Raving had learned their lesson, and it was a very big lesson too.

And so, Kat and Raven became the most obedient and dedicated pets you’d ever met.

And everyone lived happily ever after…

The end.